What can universities do to promote green initiatives and education for sustainability?

Guest speaker Jean-Lou Chameau, president of the California Institute of Technology and a noted civil engineer, weighed in on that question April 24 in the inaugural address of a new USC Viterbi School of Engineering lecture series named in honor of civil engineer and USC alumnus Albert Dorman.

The new Dorman Distinguished Lecture Series is sponsored by the USC Viterbi School’s Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering.

Dorman, who attended the lecture, is an architect who received his master’s degree in civil engineering at USC. He is founding chairman of the AECOM Technology Corp., a global company responsible for large-scale public works projects and one of the largest private corporations in the United States.

Dorman was the first person to become both a fellow of the American Institute of Architects and an honorary member of the American Society of Civil Engineering. He is also a member of the National Academy of Engineering.

Dorman and other USC dignitaries, including USC Provost C. L. Max Nikias, USC Viterbi School Dean Yannis C. Yortsos, Sonny Astani Department chair Jean-Pierre Bardet and Los Angeles real estate developer Sonny Astani, for whom the department is named, attended Chameau’s talk.

The lecture drew a standing-room only crowd of faculty, students and administrators from the USC Viterbi School and other parts of campus to the Ming Hsieh Board Room on the fifth floor of Tutor Hall.

Chameau’s technical interests include sustainable technology, environmental geotechnology, soil dynamics, earthquake engineering and soil liquefaction.

He currently serves on the board of directors for the MTS Systems Corp., the Academic Research Council of Singapore, the Council on Competitiveness and l’Ecole Polytechnique.

Chameau has been the recipient of a National Science Foundation Presidential Young Investigator Award and a Rodney Chipp Memorial Award from the Society of Women Engineers.